It is a whole lot worse than enforcing things like that. Recently, they just upped their rates in direct contravention to a governing body known as ICASA. The problem is that in this country ISPs have a very delicate problem: They are not allowed to sell bandwidth unless they're a 1st or 2nd tier ISP. In effect, this actually in some ways renders VPNs entirely illegal. You're not allowed to share bandwidth with an office if it is not in the same building. Buildings are defined as walled or solid partitions between companies, so for example one could have an office on a the 2nd floor of a "building" and an office on the 4th floor belonging to the same company, and the only way you're legally allowed to link them is to install a leased line
It goes further (I can substantiate every single one of these with direct excerpts from the Telecommunications act)... Telkom enjoys free unrestrained rights to the airways, all tellecommunications structures and even have their finger in the pie with the largest cellular service provider in the country. In development terms, we are just getting further and further behind the rest of the world in terms of communications technologies. Some people believe that that is because we're a third world country. In effect, we're not because we were amongst the first fifty connected countries in the world. We have more corporate websites than Arizona. The problem comes in the mere fact that we have not developed at the same speed as the rest of the communications world.
As far as Satalite communications go, there is no real solution. You're not allowed to do uplinks in South Africa unless going through Telkoms structure. So, satalite services are download only which after doing some calculations work out more expensive than using a Leased Line solution.
That's not a good option at all as in real terms Leased Lines cost on average up to 90% more than the same service in most other countries.
Reading articles like this just make me so damn depressed. In South Africa, we have a major problem with our Telecommunications company. They're a monopoly who controls absolutely every single aspect of communications in this country. We are being held back by huge laws which prohibit the use of any other internet connection system or device if it is not using Telkom's infrastructure. The worst thing is that the best connection we can get to the internet in this country is ISDN if you can't fork out the megabucks for a Leased Line solution. What absolutely grates me more is the mere fact that they close down companies who attempt to run alternative connection systems. Wireless providers start up but get shut down very quickly thanks to the Telkom legislation. Connecting to your neighbour is also illegal if you take a cat5 cable and run it over the wall! By the mere definitions in the legislative clauses Telkom enjoys the right to force you to rent their equipment only. And when you have 3.5 million people connecting to the internet over a duplexed 45meg pipe to the international spectrum, it must measure up to the worst infrastructures for Internet enabled countries in the world. And we're supposed to be the gateway to Africa?
I hope that someday things will change and we can also have a 1000 mbps LAN connecting our cities.
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It is a whole lot worse than enforcing things like that. Recently, they just upped their rates in direct contravention to a governing body known as ICASA. The problem is that in this country ISPs have a very delicate problem: They are not allowed to sell bandwidth unless they're a 1st or 2nd tier ISP. In effect, this actually in some ways renders VPNs entirely illegal. You're not allowed to share bandwidth with an office if it is not in the same building. Buildings are defined as walled or solid partitions between companies, so for example one could have an office on a the 2nd floor of a "building" and an office on the 4th floor belonging to the same company, and the only way you're legally allowed to link them is to install a leased line
It goes further (I can substantiate every single one of these with direct excerpts from the Telecommunications act)... Telkom enjoys free unrestrained rights to the airways, all tellecommunications structures and even have their finger in the pie with the largest cellular service provider in the country. In development terms, we are just getting further and further behind the rest of the world in terms of communications technologies. Some people believe that that is because we're a third world country. In effect, we're not because we were amongst the first fifty connected countries in the world. We have more corporate websites than Arizona. The problem comes in the mere fact that we have not developed at the same speed as the rest of the communications world.
As far as Satalite communications go, there is no real solution. You're not allowed to do uplinks in South Africa unless going through Telkoms structure. So, satalite services are download only which after doing some calculations work out more expensive than using a Leased Line solution.
That's not a good option at all as in real terms Leased Lines cost on average up to 90% more than the same service in most other countries.
Reading articles like this just make me so damn depressed. In South Africa, we have a major problem with our Telecommunications company. They're a monopoly who controls absolutely every single aspect of communications in this country. We are being held back by huge laws which prohibit the use of any other internet connection system or device if it is not using Telkom's infrastructure. The worst thing is that the best connection we can get to the internet in this country is ISDN if you can't fork out the megabucks for a Leased Line solution. What absolutely grates me more is the mere fact that they close down companies who attempt to run alternative connection systems. Wireless providers start up but get shut down very quickly thanks to the Telkom legislation. Connecting to your neighbour is also illegal if you take a cat5 cable and run it over the wall! By the mere definitions in the legislative clauses Telkom enjoys the right to force you to rent their equipment only. And when you have 3.5 million people connecting to the internet over a duplexed 45meg pipe to the international spectrum, it must measure up to the worst infrastructures for Internet enabled countries in the world. And we're supposed to be the gateway to Africa?
I hope that someday things will change and we can also have a 1000 mbps LAN connecting our cities.